


Everyone see's what I can't be

by Batgirlandrobin13



Series: Laurel Lance Character Studies [1]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012), Black Canary (Comics), DCU, The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF Laurel Lance, Character Study, Laurel Lance Centric, Laurel Lance is Alive, Multi, Past Laurel Lance/Oliver Queen, Past Laurel Lance/Tommy Merlyn, Slight Canon Divergence, So are Moira and Robert Queen though, Tommy Merlyn is a ghost, so is Sara
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-25
Updated: 2017-04-25
Packaged: 2018-10-24 00:35:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10730544
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Batgirlandrobin13/pseuds/Batgirlandrobin13
Summary: A character study of Laurel Lance





	Everyone see's what I can't be

They told her she was just going to get herself killed. She doesn't have the heart to tell them "good." She finds more and more she doesn't have the heart to tell them anything. She doesn't tell them about the pain in her heart that used to be removed by helping people in a courtroom.  
Her job offers no relief now. However Dinah Laurel Lance always trying to save the world still rings in her ears. She refuses to let Tommy down. 

She wants to scream, "Are you proud of me now." She doesn't. She can't. The others, they already act like she doesn't belong. How would they react to learning she talks to ghosts. Her ghosts: Tommy, and... Sara. Could Sara even be proud of her?

She sometimes sees Thea's ghosts. Moira, and Robert. She talks to them too. Tells them what an ass their son is being. How wonderful their daughter is turning out. She talks to ghosts that hover a bit to close to her skin. She knows they're waiting to take her away. So sure she's going to die. She should voice this to someone. 

Who? Her dad? He'd try to lock her up. Oliver? She owes him nothing. He wasn't there for her before. Why would he be here now? So she doesn't tell them. The ghosts grow closer. She doesn't get better. Sure she smiles more. Most of them are fake. Cisco, he surprises a real one out of her.  
The others only tell her she's going to die, but Cisco he says he loves her. Or the way she beats up criminals anyways.  
She smiles and on her weekly lunches with Thea. She does not shut up about him. Thea smiles and laughs. 

Thea says, "You know that was the first time I've seen you smile sense Sara's death." That surprises Laurel. It shouldn't, but it does. She thought she was doing better then that. Thought she was better at hiding things now, but Laurel forgets just how well Thea knows her. Thea who killed Sara because of Merlyn. How could Oliver ever think she could blame Thea? It wasn't Thea's fault. 

She goes through the motions of living. She trains in Ted Grant's gym. When he leaves Starling he leaves the gym to her.  
"The Black Canary needs her own hideout Laurel."  
She goes there even after she's fully welcomed onto the team. It's her place. The first one to truly accept her. In all her faults.

She trains with Nyssa and befriends her too. Maybe in another life there would be something more there. She hopes in another life...  
Her only romances really ever being with Oliver and Tommy. She never shares this with Thea who once upon a time was so convinced that Laurel had dated millions of bad boys. Oliver should count for that many anyways. Laurel thought.

She doesn't think Roy is anywhere near good enough for Thea anyways, but she never says that. Never tells Thea how badly Roy treated her when she was starting out. She doesn't want to ruin Thea's perspective of him. There's so much she's never said. 

She watched Oliver fade from glory with Felicity. She should've seen it. His eyes mirrored her own. That should've been her clue, but her eyes haven't look liked that in years. 

Laurel notices things that none of them notice. She never tells them though. No they don't need to know. Their insults still ring in the back of her mind. They didn't want her opinion before so why would they want it now.

Now she's working with John. She refuses to call him Diggle, because no one should be reduced to a last name. Also Director Diggle of Argus doesn't exactly help. She meets Sara Diggle. Her sisters namesake. She cries the first time she hears the reasoning behind that name. She has to leave. 

Thea is on her heels as always now. Thea who couldn't stay in her loft. Thea who Laurel found sobbing above a bloodstained carpet. Thea who sleeps in Laurels spare room. One of them. Her office has a pullout couch in. She never tells Thea why. Thea who Laurel has all but adopted as her second little sister. Thea who's ghosts haunt them both now.

Laurel's ghosts go nowhere near Thea, so being around Thea makes the ghosts move farther away. No longer hovering over her skin. She watches them from afar now.  
She wakes more often then not with either Thea or herself screaming from nightmares. Laurel sets up a movie and gets ice cream and they fall back to sleep in the living room. Laurel who works all day and fights crime at night. Laurel who's eyes blur and don't focus. She lives off coffee and nothing else. 

There is no wine or beer or anything like that in her apartment. Thea makes sure of that. Thea who holds her when she's shaking. It had been a bad day. She needs a drink, or a pill. So Thea holds her and gets ice cream and soda instead.  
Thea who whispers one night, "I always thought it would be you and Ollie at the end."  
Laurel doesn't know how to respond to that. Thea doesn't expect an answer. 

See this story has always been about the Lance family and the Queen family. Just not the way anyone thought. 

Thea watches like a hawk as Laurel writes her will out over and over again. Things change. Time goes on. Thea finds it sad. Laurel just laughs and doesn't say she's been writing them since she was 15. She doesn't show Thea the notes in her closet.

Thea will find them in about a year and cry because she just wanted her sister back. It's Laurel who sees that they need more man power to deal with the ghosts. Not hers. A hive of ghosts. 

So they get Oliver. Oliver's not exactly who she meant, but it's fine. (Everything has to be fine) 

She brings Sara back to life and Thea tags along. Laurel wants to find a cure for Thea's bloodlust just as much as she wants to save her sister. She wants to save them both.

"I'm going to save them both" she says to the ghost of Moira Queen. Who smiles and laughs at her.  
She screams at Oliver in the hallway after Thea was hurt. Thea could die because of her. Why did she think this was a good idea? The ghosts are back. They ripple against her skin now. Even after she helps save Sara's soul they don't leave. 

She should whisper to Thea that she thinks she's dying., but shots ring out the night Oliver proposes to his girlfriend. Fiance now Laurel reminds herself. She's to distracted with making sure Felicity is okay and that Oliver doesn't get himself killed to worry about herself. (She never could allow herself to be selfish anymore)Felicity spends 3 weeks in a wheelchair getting advice at every turn. 

Laurel wants to scream at her after Felicity breaks of the engagement. It wasn't Oliver's fault. Did you not hear Samantha? Shouldn't Laurel be allowed to be more upset then Felicity. Laurel was the one he was supposed to be dating when Samantha got pregnant. She doesn't only blame Samantha though. She blames Oliver too. 

For the first time she listens to Thea when Thea says scream about what an ass my brother is. So she does and everything pores out. Thea doesn't talk to Oliver for a few days. Oliver gets mad at Laurel for that. That's okay Laurel's used to that. 

Then's there's a fake wedding and a robotic bee attack when Laurel notices. 

Laurel doesn't need the canary cry device to do the canary cry. She uses Ted's gym to test her theory. She's right. She's a meta-human. She should talk to Team Flash about that. 

She doesn't get a chance. She doesn't get to tell anyone. In a prison break Damian Darkh stabs her with one of Oliver's arrows. Oh no that means Ollie's going to blame himself. They're all going to blame themselves. 

She tells them then, "Going out there with you guys it's what makes me feel alive inside." She doesn't think in her haze that anyone but Thea understands the true meaning behind those words.  
"She's only dead because she was the black canary" is what they'll say about her.  
She hopes Thea will snap. "Yeah and she lasted a whole lot longer then she would've if she wasn't." Thea doesn't say that ever. It's better that way. Laurel watched them leave. 

She almost cries "Don't go Thea please" Her ghost circles her. It's only Tommy now. Sara is alive off saving the universe. 

She almost says, "Look Tommy you picked the wrong Lance sister. Sara's the one whose going to save the world." There is a very big difference between Laurel and Sara. One of those differences is that Laurel has embraced her inner darkness. 

Helena's words still in the back of her head, "Once you let the darkness inside it never comes out." Laurel never got to thank Helena for the advice. Sara runs from her darkness. That's alright. Laurel thinks. One of us needs to believe in redemption. 

She calls Oliver the love of her life. It's both a lie and a truth. She says she's happy he found Felicity. She meant she was happy he was happy. 

She calls Oliver the love of her life. She's telling the truth because Tommy has haunted her since the day he died and she's no longer willing to call him anything remotely similar.

She's lying because when she says love of her life. She pictures a red headed woman who sometimes crashed in Laurel's office. A voice in her ear. One that adds helpful information to the stuff Felicity gives the team. 

When she does die its Thea's name on her lips and the red headed woman's voice in her head. She never told anyone so many things. 

Oliver speaks at her funeral. Well the one open to her family and colleagues anyways. He calls her a hero. Laurel smiles proudly from behind him. She's not sure which Queen sibling she's haunting yet. 

Not until later after every one had left. Thea and a handful of others come back and hold a second funeral. The red headed woman among them. Thea's never met these people before, but she knows that these people are the ones who knew Laurel best.  
Thea speaks then, "Dinah Laurel Lance was my best friend. More then that she was my big sister. She left so much behind. She never told me about you guys. She never told me a lot. Dinah Laurel Lance knew she was going to die and its our job the find away to bring her back." Oh Thea. Laurel sighs. How is she going to explain this one?

 

 

It's over two years before Dinah Laurel Lance returns to the living. Sara her little sibling is older then her now. She try's not to think about that. Over two years have passed and everyone besides a couple of people have moved on. Thea and the red headed woman stand there by her side when she awakens. The Lazarus pit has no effect on her. Or at least not the same one that it had on Thea and Sara. But that's another story entirely.


End file.
